For a moment Amigo stared at the gun and the man, and his mouth drew down with contempt.
"Ha! Pendejo!" he grunted, and kicked the corpse with his foot.
But if the Mexican had been a fool, he had paid the price, for the second time he snapped his gun Amigo had shot him through and through.
XX
In a country where witnesses to a crime are imprisoned along with the principals and kept more or less indefinitely in jail, a man thinks twice before he reports to the police.
With four dead Mexicans to the Yaqui's account, and Del Ray in charge of the district, Hooker followed his second thought—he said nothing, and took his chances on being arrested for murder. Until far into the night Amigo busied himself along the hillside, and when the sun rose not a sign remained to tell the story of the fight.
Men, horses, saddles, and guns—all had disappeared. And, after packing a little food in a sack, Amigo disappeared also, with a grim smile in promise of return.
The sun rose round and hot, the same as usual; the south wind came up and blew into a bellying mass of clouds, which lashed back with the accustomed rain; and when all the earth was washed clean and fresh the last trace of the struggle was gone. Only by the burns on his hands was Hooker aware of the fight and of the treachery which had reared its head against him like a snake which has been warmed and fed.
Nowhere but in Mexico, where the low pelado classes have made such deeds a subtlety, could the man be found to dissimulate like that false assassin-in-chief. To pause suddenly in a protracted speech, swing over and pick up a gun, and halt his victim for the shooting by the preparatory click of the lock—that indeed called for a brand of cunning rarely found in the United States.